


Wherein Jim and Chekov are buried under rubble

by kayliemalinza



Series: Rambleverse [36]
Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Bickering, Gen, Injury, Kayliemalinza's Rambleverse, Kirk's Temporary Captaincy (Rambleverse Timeline)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-08-30
Updated: 2010-08-30
Packaged: 2017-11-23 21:38:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/626787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kayliemalinza/pseuds/kayliemalinza
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Apparently Jim wasn't the only thing the Admiralty shoved out of spacedock before it was ready. A few weeks before Pike is due to return, there's a disaster on the bridge.</p><p>Teaser: Jim barely has time to snatch Chekov out of his chair before the console rears up like some bizarre and furious metal beast. There's danger in all directions—the ceiling shedding plates, the razor blade tectonics of the deck, the viewscreen oozing technicolor slime—and microseconds in which to avoid them all.</p><p>Jim tucks Chekov against his chest and throws both of them beneath the console as it plummets down.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wherein Jim and Chekov are buried under rubble

**Author's Note:**

  * For [StuntMuppet](https://archiveofourown.org/users/StuntMuppet/gifts).



The sudden turbulence throws Jim against the arm of the captain's chair and holy hell, that's going to bruise. "Sulu, I told you to steer _around_ the gas envelope!" he snaps and jumps up to lean over Sulu's station, checking the controls.

"The gas envelope isn't stable, sir. I'm doing the best I can," Sulu says in that voice of infinite patience which means he thinks that Poor Jim is getting cranky from all the stress so Sulu will be nice to him instead of pointing out how he's the awesomest pilot ever and Jim should shut the hell up.

Jim feels it's important for there to be mutual respect between a captain and his crew, so he shuts the hell up without needing to be told. "Right, sorry," he mumbles. "Carry on." He still hovers over Sulu's shoulder to keep an eye on things, though, but not because he thinks Sulu can't handle it himself. It's because Sulu could be piloting them safely through solid rock without so much as a whisper of "Hey look what I did."

Sulu is the master of quiet modesty and to be perfectly honest, that annoys the crap out of Jim. He just wants to be able to properly reward his best crew members, is all. He's not still bitter about Sulu hustling him at beer pong in second year, or anything. It's not like Jim was stuck eating pot noodles for a week, or anything. 'Never played before' his ass.

A klaxon blares suddenly and Sulu goes into Super Effective mode, wrists and fingers limited to the smallest, most necessary of movements as the viewscreen frazzles purple. Jim steps aside to give him room and stares over Chekov's shoulder instead. Chekov glances up at him with the cutest little furrow between his eyebrows and says, "Captain, is there something wrong with your chair?"

"No," says Jim, mystified and somewhat offended, because The Captain's Chair is a sacred symbol of The Captain's, um, Captaincy, so clearly Jim's chair is going to be awesome and there's nothing wrong whatsoever.

"Then why are you standing here?" Chekov asks.

Everyone on the bridge is watching their own screens, chattering to the people next to them and at stations elsewhere in the ship through comms, raising their voices or covering their ears as needed to block out the pings and whirps of the equipment. There's a good chance that no-one just heard Chekov sass him but still, Jim is not a happy captain.

He opens his mouth, possibly to chide Chekov (not likely) or to apologize and step back (slightly more likely) or to bark out some near-redundant order just to scurry on past this awkward moment (very likely) but then the decking buckles. Jim barely has time to snatch Chekov out of his chair before the console rears up like some bizarre and furious metal beast. There's danger in all directions—the ceiling shedding plates, the razor blade tectonics of the deck, the viewscreen oozing technicolor slime—and microseconds in which to avoid them all.

Jim tucks Chekov against his chest and throws both of them beneath the console as it plummets down.

_____________

The first thing Jim hears after a long period of hearing too much is Spock's voice, carrying clearly over the din of post-event recovery. "Doctor McCoy, I am sure that your presence is needed in the medical bay. It is your duty as the Chief Medical Officer—"

"Dammit, Spock, I know what my duty is! If you're giving orders, then something's happened to Jim. Seeing as he's the goddamned captain, my duty is to attend to him first!"

The fury in Bones' voice makes Jim feel warm and fuzzy inside. Regulations would probably back up this "captain goes first" claim, but Jim knows that Bones is just rationalizing. Bones ran up to the bridge because he was worried, and a man needs a friend like that out in the black. Jim will be sure to show his gratitude to Bones later, probably by clapping him on the back and drinking his bourbon.

Spock doesn't sound as touched by Bones' dedication. "However sound your reasoning may be, Doctor, your presence here is unnecessary. We are currently unable to locate the captain. Return to Sickbay, and I will call you when your abilities are required."

There is a brief, tense pause, and Jim wants to laugh his ass off. Bones and Spock facing off cracks him up; he can't help it.

"You can't _find_ him?" Bones hisses rather than yells, probably out of concern for the bridge crew, who would be freaking out right now if they weren't so well trained. For all they know, Jim could be stuffed into a Jeffries tube somewhere—or in several Jeffries tubes somewhere, if they've been watching a lot of horror vids lately. Jim knows for a fact that Bones _has_ been watching horror films lately. Jim was watching some for the sake of cultural edification (that sort of thing is important for a captain) and he wanted company, and Bones is his best friend and best friends have certain non-negotiable obligations. Bones protested, pleaded even, but Jim was adamant.

He feels guilty about that now.

"Bones!" he yells, ignoring Chekov's flinch. "BONES!"

"Captain, you are yelling right in my ear," Chekov complains.

"I can't exactly move out of the way," Jim says apologetically.

Just beyond the metal plating, Jim can hear the crew scrambling around. Bones starts calling his name and again with the warm fuzzies.

"Under the Nav console!" Jim shouts.

Chekov heaves the most put-upon sigh in the world.

"Under here!" Bones yells from much closer by. It sounds like he's trying to lift the plating on his own, which is honestly a very stupid (although touching) thing to do.

Spock concurs. "Doctor, do not attempt to lift the debris. Your human strength is grossly inadequate to the task. You may cause the captain further harm."

"Then _you_ do it, you green-blooded bastard!"

Jim should really have a talk with Bones about insulting a ranking officer in front of the crew. It's probably bad for morale. Then again, Jim is laughing about it right in the ear of the youngest and arguably most impressionable member of the bridge crew so he doesn't exactly have the high ground here.

"Doctor, by my calculations, even my Vulcan strength would be—"

"Damn your calculations, man! Jim's in danger and you're just going to stand there and quote _numbers_ —"

"Doctor McCoy!" Jim calls out. "I'm alright for the moment. Ensign Chekov is here and he's uninjured as well." Jim looks down at Chekov, just the little grey sliver of him that he can see. "That's right, isn't it?" Jim asks. "No broken bones or anything?"

"I am only a little sore," Chekov says. "And my ear hurts."

"Sorry about that," Jim mumbles.

There's some beeping and a couple of muttered curses from the other side of the paneling. Bones sounds close, like he put his mouth right up to the crack in the plating. "You sure you're alright, Jim? My tricorder is picking up your life signals but there's too much interference for me to be sure of anything. You're probably both bruised to high hell," he says with a sigh.

"That is very astute of you, Doctor," Chekov says, and there's a moment of silence while both Jim and Bones try to work out if he's being sarcastic or not.

Finally Bones asks, "How the hell did you manage to get stuck under the only pile of rubble on the whole damn bridge, Jim?" He sounds pissed off now, like Jim somehow did this on purpose. Which, ok, Jim _did_ do it on purpose, but either way he'd cut off his right hand to see the look on Bones' face. He probably has the same expression he did when his daughter commed (at the stern insistence of her mother) to confess that she had a concussion because she didn't wear her bike helmet.

Jim really doesn't want to examine this too much, but he's kinda hardwired to enjoy it when Bones yells at people for doing stupid things, with an extra bonus if he goes into a rant about losing years off his life from worry. Jim feels like a freak but he suspects that Joanna gets a kick out of it, too. Bones' daughter is the coolest kid Jim has ever met so if she likes something, then it must be ok (boy bands excepted.)

"He was backseat driving," Chekov pipes up.

Jim blinks for a couple of seconds in shock. "Excuse me!" he says over the sound of Bones' sudden laughter. Maybe he's new to this whole captaining thing, ok, but he's pretty sure that accusations of 'backseat driving' are grossly disrespectful. And he's _not_ a backseat driver. He's just keeping an eye on his crew, like a good captain should. And anyway, "I fail to see what that has to do with the current situation," he says sternly.

"If you were not leaning over my shoulder, then you would not be trapped under here," Chekov answers primly.

"What—I _saved_ you," Jim points out. "You'd be under here no matter what, except you'd be a hell of a lot more banged up than you are now." Jim knows this for a fact because, despite what he told Bones earlier, his back hurts like fuck. "Bones, this isn't funny."

Bones doesn't seem to agree.

"I do not see how that is true," Chekov says. "It is a very bad idea to jump under falling objects, Captain."

"Doctor McCoy, how many other crew are injured?" Jim asks sharply.

"Eleven," Bones says immediately, because maybe he's not Starfleet to the core but he trained up nicely regardless. "Mostly chemical burns, some blistering from the electricity overload, cuts and scrapes from the ceiling plates," he explains. "Uhura's in surgery."

"Is it bad?" Jim asks.

"Open compound fracture of the left humerus," Bones says, in his special tone that means _not bad, but hell if I'll say so_. Pessimism and superstition mix eerily well in surgeons, Jim's discovered. "We'll have everything regenerated by alpha shift tomorrow, but the plate hacked off a good six inches of hair."

"She'll find a way to blame me for that," Jim says solemnly. He glances down at Chekov, who is upsetting the shadows with all the squinting he's doing. "Was there something you wanted to blame me for, Ensign?" he asks.

"No," Chekov says, and then grudgingly adds: "Thank you."

"You're welcome," Jim says. "Bones, tell Mr. Spock that I'm going to need to look over the blueprints and the construction and maintenance records, ok? I'm pretty sure that turning into rubble isn't one of the normal functions of the Nav console."

"Yessir," says Bones, then adds "Hang on—"

"Excuse me, Doctor," comes Spock's voice. There's some scraping and shuffling that is probably Bones (reluctantly) vacating his spot. "Captain," says Spock.

"Mr. Spock," Jim says in an identical formal, neutral tone. He's responding to Spock in like manner as a sign of respect. He's not mocking him or anything, because that would be juvenile. Not that Spock would notice, anyway.

"I have ordered Engineering to bring up a winch," Spock reports. "However, many of the turbolifts between the Engineering section and the bridge are without power, so I cannot estimate how quickly they will arrive."

"Thank you," Jim says. "Continue with the damage control. Mr. Chekov and I will keep for a while." The ship will be perfectly fine without him in charge, maybe even better with Spock dealing with everything, but Jim is really not going to think about that right now. He's buried under rubble; that's enough suckage for the moment.

"Yes, Captain," says Spock, as unconcerned with Jim's invisible crisis of responsibility as he usually is. Jim can hear him move away and then say, "As you can now see for yourself, Doctor, your presence is not needed here."

Bones grumbles to himself. The specifics are lost to the muffling of the plating, which is a shame because Bones cusses with a homey flair that always makes Jim smile. "Well, alright," Bones says. "But I want them down in Medbay the instant they're free, you hear me? The very _instant_."

"Instantaneous transportation of solid matter within the ship is highly inadvisable. The technology available aboard _Enterprise_ was not designed to operate in that manner, a fact of which I believe you are aware, Doctor," says Spock. "I am therefore perplexed that you would make such a request."

Jim is very sad for a moment that he cannot witness the way Bones' eyes must be bugging out right now, but consoles himself that he has access to surveillance footage. It's not the same as seeing it in person, of course, but it does allow for zoom, enhance, and all sorts of other nifty options. Jim is thinking of putting a nice scroll-work border on a screencap and hanging it on the wall in his quarters.

"I meant get them down to Sickbay as soon as possible," Bones is growling.

"If that is what you meant," Spock answers, "then that is what you should have said."

Jim is beginning to suspect that Spock does this on purpose. "Someone needs to turn a hose on them," he mutters.

"'Turn a hose on them,' sir?" Chekov asks. "I do not understand this."

In the background, Bones' voice is barely below a shout and Jim can't help smiling. It occurs to Jim that he is very cheerful, in the circumstances.

"Like a garden hose," he says. "You know how you spray dogs with water to stop them from fighting?"

"Oh!" says Chekov, and Kirk can practically hear the 'ding!' of the lightbulb going on. He only knows about that old metaphor because he was forced— _forced_ —watch some WWII era cartoons in his Federation history class first year. He didn't enjoy them, though, and certainly didn't find a whole bunch of others in the library archives and download them to his PADD. He absolutely did not, and anything Bones says is a lie (except for when he agreed with Jim that Betty Boop is totally bangable.)

"In Russia," Chekov says solemnly, "we use water more often to break up dogs which are copulating."

Jim's inexplicable good mood is officially over.

Chekov cocks his head to the side. "Captain," he says. "Do you think that—"

"No, I do not," Jim says sternly. "And that's all that needs to be said on the matter."

"Yes, Captain." Chekov sighs.

There is a long moment of silence between them and Jim can hear Spock say, "I highly doubt that expediency is your utmost concern. If it were, then you would have returned to Sickbay when I first ordered you to, approximately twelve minutes ago."

Jim wonders at what point having an XO and a CMO who each insist on having the last word becomes a detriment to ship operations.

"I do not wish to go to Sickbay," Chekov says conversationally.

"Ensign, getting buried under rubble isn't something you can just walk off," Jim points out.

"Yes, I know this, but Doctor McCoy is a very unpleasant doctor." Chekov sounds sour.

"You really think so?" Jim asks with considerable surprise. Personally, he loves having Bones as a doctor, but maybe that's because he has long since convinced Bones that every doctor's visit for Jim ends with a hug and a lollipop. No fucking exceptions.

Chekov isn't adverse to explaining himself, any more than he was adverse to making that completely baseless accusation about backseat driving which, understandably, Jim is still pissed about. "I needed a vaccination before this mission, remember?" says Chekov. "And Doctor McCoy, he told me that it will not hurt, but it _did_ hurt."

Jim has to think on that for a second before he realizes that Chekov is talking about the immunization for some disease—he can't remember the name of it, but it makes you turn blue, and everyone knows that so he doesn't need to know the name, ok, he just says 'it's that one that makes people turn blue!' and every single medical professional ever knows what he's talking about. He made an informal survey of this so it is absolutely true.

The disease is quite the special snowflake, and not just for the symptoms; for some inscrutable reason involving words with way too many syllables, the immunization must be delivered via "deep intramuscular injection" so it has come to pass that, literally, Bones has seen every ass on the ship. And apparently hyposprays don't go deep enough, so he had to use—

"Dude, the needle for that was six inches long," Jim blurts, then mentally kicks himself. He promised Pike that he'd stop saying 'dude' because it wasn't captainly.

"That is why I asked!" Chekov replies hotly. "And Doctor McCoy, he said, 'Why, Mister Chekov, of course this enormous needle will not hurt, not even the tiniest bit.' He was very wrong about that."

Jim isn't going to be too hard on Bones for that one. Everyone makes mistakes. For example, Jim assumed Bones' sarcasm was broad enough to cross all language barriers.

Still, it is important as captain to pay due attention to the concerns of all crewmembers. "I'll have a talk with him about that," Jim says sincerely.

He'll probably bring it up to break the silence when Bones and he are cooped up in a ready room somewhere, slogging through the pile of bureaucratic nonsense that Admiral Pike insists must be completed, yes, _all_ of it, and sometime this millennium if you please. Pike even beamed aboard for a surprise inspection last month, going so far as to chastise Jim's casual manner in the captain's chair. His exact words were, if Jim remembers correctly, "Don't get comfortable, punk." Jim remembers because there was a peculiar subtext to the utterance that he couldn't quite interpret. Admiral Pike can be very ambiguous at times. He is, however, scarily precise with his wheelchair. Jim's left big toe will never be the same again.

"Do not worry about it, sir, I know you are very busy as it is," Chekov says, which would be sweet and considerate if he didn't follow it up with: "I will simply let Admiral Pike know upon his return to _Enterprise_."

"Oh, are you in a hurry to get Pike back?" Jim asks, and he's a little offended, frankly, because even though he got off to kind of a rocky start he's gotten the hang of this captain thing, now, and he even sleeps most days. It's been a month since anything exploded—though obviously that count will have to be reset now—and last week he went in for a walk-through inspection of Medbay and Bones actually let Jim leave without making him drink one of those semi-solid nutrient supplements and remanding him to a biobed for a few minutes of induced-REM sleep.

That's standard procedure for exhaustion and stress, by the way, and not at all analogous to giving Jim a juice box and putting him down for a nap.

Chekov shifts so that Jim gets a mouthful of curls, and not in the way he's used to (or used to be used to, before he got catapulted into captainhood and had to temporarily disband the party in his pants.) "Yes, sir," Chekov says, nicely enough. "I specially requested a post on _Enterprise_ to work under Pike. He has a very exciting service record."

Jim really can't argue with that, and he's about to launch into fanboy mode before he realizes that he can't remember which details are from the official version of Pike's record and which he culled from various forays into restricted digispace, and although Jim wouldn't put it past Chekov to have done the same thing, he isn't going to risk earning himself a court-martial for leaking classified information. The last court-martial was bad enough.

Still. "My record is pretty exciting, too," Jim says.

Chekov scoffs. He literally _scoffs!_ Jim will remember this if, the next time he's trapped under rubble, he gets to choose who's under there with him. "I was there also," Chekov says, and ok, that's a good point, but there's no need for scoffing, and Jim is about to point this out but Chekov asks, "Do you know when Admiral Pike will be returning, sir?"

"Um, yeah," says Jim. "He'll be coming aboard in two or three weeks." Jim just found out this morning, actually, but he'll stab himself with a sharpened stylus before he admits that he wept tears of sweet relief and tried to hug Pike through the vidscreen. In his defense, it's been a very bad week for minor (but infinitely frustrating) equipment malfunctions (such as the one currently happening, with the rubble and the injuries and the mouthy navigator and everything.) From what he could gather from the sporadic lulls in Pike's profanity, Jim wasn't the only thing the Admiralty shoved out of dock before it was completely space-ready.

"That is wonderful," Chekov says. "Maybe then _Enterprise_ can start her deep-space mission. I am very excited about that, aren't you?"

"Yeah," says Jim. Chekov starts going on about quasars and silicon-based lifeforms and Jim listens, asking the right questions when Chekov pauses for a breath, but mostly he's concentrating on coaxing his trembling arms to keep his weight from crushing his young navigator, and he's imagining Uhura slotted into the bristly chrome-colored regenerator with her shorn hair falling down, and Bones' kid speaking through static on a too-small screen. He's thinking about how the bridge looks from his chair: shiny and complex and filled with good people.


End file.
